An Imperial Professor is Giving Students LSD and Watching What Happens

It could be a ‘superhighway to the unconscious’Acid-head students are pestering university academics to let them join a new study where volunteers are injected with LSD.

An Imperial Professor is Giving Students LSD and Watching What Happens

Scientists at Imperial College have been experimenting with the hallucinogenic drug to explore hopes that it could be used to treat depression. But the doc in charge of the experiment said hordes of students wanted to take part.

We had a battering of students who wanted to take part and take LSD. One or two students were recruited to the LSD study out of 20 participants, who were mostly professionals. – Dr Robin Carhart-Harris

Dr Robin Carhart-Harris said he was inundated with students wanting to take LSD

Scientists hope to prove the psychedelic drug may hold the key to curing anxiety, addiction and depression by giving participants LSD and monitoring the effects on the brain. Ketamine has also been lauded as a potential wonder cure for depression and Carhart-Harris hopes for a similar outcome.

Every one of the participants was healthy, both psychologically and physically, and had used a psychedelic drug, like LSD or DMT, before.

He added: “We’ll try and work out how the drug works on the brain. There’s a number of different potential applications: in psychiatry, in treating addiction and anxiety and also depression.

It’s similar to ketamine but with fewer side effects. With LSD, bad trips are a main issue and anxiety during the acute experience. It’s very important that people’s experiences are managed properly. There should be a degree of rapport is built before the patient has an experience. sufficient aftercare.”

Imperial College – Queens Tower

Imperial Queens Tower – so high

Carhart-Harris is injecting his volunteers with LSD and psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) and then using scanners like MRIs to see what happens in their brain.

His findings suggest LSD works by suppressing the parts of your brain which regulate your perception.

The 34-year-old previously worked under David Nutt, the government adviser on drugs who was sacked after he said psychedelic drugs were safer than alcohol.

In an interview with the New Yorker this month, he said: “Freud said dreams were the royal road to the unconscious. LSD may turn out to be the superhighway.”

The New Yorker article, “Trip Treatment” discusses how universities and scientists are testing the potential medical benefits of hallucinogens like LSD and psilocybin.

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